Quarters of Sunshine and Solitude
by lorriesherbet
Summary: In the sunlit city of Konoha, Sakura lives as a soldier of the military; surrounded by family, friends, love and sunshine. But she hears whispers from deep within the city that things may not be as perfect as they seem and that sometimes, the enemy can already be inside.


**Full Summary: **In the sunlit city of Konoha, Sakura lives as a soldier of the military; surrounded by family, friends, love and sunshine. But she hears whispers from deep within the city that things may not be as perfect as they seem and that sometimes, the enemy can already be inside.

**Warnings: **Possible sexual content in later chapters. Also swearing. Quite a lot of it in fact. What can I say? I seem to have a knack for it.

**Pairings:** The main pairing is going to be ItaSaku, however the side pairings are still undecided. If anyone is rooting for a particular pairing, feel free to tell me. I can't promise that it will happen but you never know, I might get ideas.

**Disclaimer:** As much as I wish it wasn't the case, I simply don't own Naruto.

* * *

It was a sunny day. A pink haired sixteen year old sat on a rusting metal bench on the station platform as she waited for the next train to work. With the glare of the summer sun sizzling on her face, Sakura was just grateful that she had remembered her sunglasses and had slavered what had to be about half a tub of sun cream on her face and arms before she left the house that morning. She was ridiculously prone to burning in the sun and would have to remember to thank her mum for reminding her to 'cream up' over breakfast.

Because of the nature of her job, she had to be at work at 7am, Monday to Friday. An hour and a half before most commuters would arrive; the platform was mostly empty so far, with the exception of the few familiar faces that she saw every workday morning. She had no idea where any of them worked or even who they actually were but out of boredom on slow mornings, she had made a game out of naming them and guessing details of their lives.

There was that sluggish guy in his mid-twenties with shoulder length shabby brown hair, who always had a cigarette dangling from his mouth. From what she had been able to discern, his 'uniform' was a pair of black khaki trousers and a green bomber jacket. Sakura had taken the liberty of dubbing him Jet, in honour of the TV character that he reminded her of from her childhood. He usually sat on the platform opposite her, smoking with his eyes closed and his head back; doing his upmost to ignore the possibility of other human life.

Sitting a few benches over from Jet was a dark haired girl wearing a grey and blue uniform, which Sakura was convinced, was from that sweet shop she went to with Ino and the rest of their friends a few months ago. The girl looked about sixteen and had probably left school as well, as the leaving age in Konoha was fifteen. The feature that Sakura always associated with her however was her stunning rouge eyes. They reminded Sakura of the eyes of one of her superiors at work and she was convinced that there was some kind of family connection. No one had eyes that similar. So really, it came as no surprise to Sakura that she thought of the girl as Red; although it did make her a little bit depressed at her lack of any discernible imagination in naming.

The only one of the three people here - other than herself, obviously - that she had any legitimate, that is to say not fabricated, knowledge about was a black haired guy of about eighteen or nineteen, sporting a bowl cut and wearing green suit jacket and trousers. She had seen him around work once or twice and had heard from a co-worker that he had some kind of disability but to be honest, she didn't know him well enough to even refer to him as an acquaintance. She called him Bowl-Cut.

Sakura huffed slightly and leaned back onto the hot metal of the seat. She wondered if the others had thought of a name for her in the eight months that she had been getting on this train. She could only hope that it was both flattering and more inventive than her own pitiful creations. Waiting in the morning had been painfully boring since her oldest friend Ino had moved to the other side of the city last year. The two of them used to have endless fun chatting and giggling about the cute boys in their neighbourhood while they walked to their local school together.

Sometimes it was hard to believe that that was only last year. When they had left school, Ino had chosen to work in the new flower shop that her family was opening. Sakura had been devastated when Ino told her that she was moving away. The pink haired girl had imagined the two of them living in the same area, the place in which they had both grown up, with their families, and their children playing together – not in the streets like Sakura and Ino had though, that was dangerous – since she was six years old. Talk about crushed expectations. Sakura had gone home, had a good cry, moped for a few days, and then finally decided to do something with her life. She decided to join the military.

In Konoha, all children were given compulsory combat and self-defence training from the ages of seven to fifteen. After that, they were free to do what they wanted with their lives. The reason for the mandate was that although Konoha was currently at peace, there was always tension between countries and Sakura remembered from her history lessons in school that the last war had only ended about twenty years ago.

And so, Sakura had signed up. She couldn't help but grimace, however, when she remembered how her parents had reacted. Let's just say that they didn't take it well. And things were said on both sides which should never have been spoken. She had made comments about how they just wanted her life to be as boring and unfulfilled as theirs and they had told her in no uncertain terms that if she joined up, she would be coming home in a body bag. Sure, things were alright between the three of them now, but Sakura still tried to bring up the specifics of her job as little as possible. She could only deal with the strained atmosphere that always followed that subject so often before wanting to tear all of her hair out.

Her local station was quite small which she supposed was a given considering the relatively tiny size of her borough. Only the people in her area really used it with any frequency as there was a larger, better equipped station not too far away that most of the people in the areas surrounding hers chose to use. Sakura however, in collaboration with her parents, had decided that this station, Kikitsu, was obviously the better choice, as it was within reasonable walking of home and meant that she largely avoided bustling crowds of people on the platform.

Sakura started rummaging in her brown leather satchel, looking for that bottle of water she packed on her way out of the house, when her train pulled in. It jerked to a halt in front of her and she hefted her bag over her shoulder before jumping on. She wiped the perspiration off of her forehead with her hand and looked around for a seat; spying some near the end of the carriage. The train wasn't that full this time in the morning and most of the passengers were heading to the same place she was. Straightening her red dress, the pink haired girl took one of the window seats. The train started to pull away from the station and she smiled, looking at the passing city with the sun feathering her face.

Today felt like a good day.

* * *

There were many military buildings and sites around the city but as Sakura was still being supervised as trainee, she always headed to the building designed for new recruits, which was located near the headquarters for easy and fast contact between higher level ninja and their students. Because Sakura had passed her first assessments, she was legally considered an active shinobi. However she was well aware that by no means did this make her an exceptional shinobi and even if it frustrated her, she was still only allowed C-Rank missions and below.

The only consolation was that her teammates were still stuck doing them as well.

With the exception of that one A-Rank mission which was _not_ supposed to be an A-Rank mission, she didn't expect to get any higher than a C-Rank until she had more experience. And wasn't that just the kicker. She needed to be allowed to do higher ranking missions to get the experience to be allowed to do higher ranking missions. It was a vicious circle. Sakura rubbed her eyes – a habit of hers – under her sunglasses as she walked towards the building that herself and dozens of trainee shinobi before her had affectionately dubbed BOT (aka Building Of Torture). What could she say? Military types just loved their acronyms.

The foyer of the building was all air conditioning, white tiles and potted palm trees. Its ambiance didn't fool her, not after eight months of getting to know the torture part of the acronym better than she had ever wanted to. Still, she couldn't help but smile. She loved this place. And she knew that all that exercise and training was to make her stronger anyway.

Sakura wandered with the rest of the shinobi who had just arrived for the day to the large wall adjacent to the entrance, which was outfitted with electronic boxes with slots to insert your identification card to sign in and out. While waiting in the queue that had formed, the green eyed girl looked around for her friend Kiba. The brown haired boy had been the first person that she met when she initially arrived here months ago and they had bonded over their joint investigation of the building and their mutual love of animals and espressos. Not necessarily in that order. On the weekends, they would go over to each other's houses and watch movies – she kept the click flicks to a minimum and he didn't bombard her with his favourite sci-fi films – or they would just hang out around the city with Ino and his friend Shino.

_I bet he's late, the lazy sod, _she though warmly.

Sakura rolled her eyes and swiped her card before moving towards the locker room to dump her satchel.

After that, she navigated her way through the crowd towards the meeting room where her superior officer and assigned trainer would probably be waiting – in about an hour. Late, as always. Sometimes, just sometimes, she felt like she was positively _surrounded_ by lazy idiots. Then of course, that illusion was broken when she got her ass kicked in a sparring match with her teacher. Every. Time.

Once she was inside the room, she caught sight of her two teammates. A few months after she had first started here she, along with all of the other new recruits, was assigned to a team and allocated a jonin teacher for more specialised training. She couldn't help but wish that her team got on a little better. Naruto talked all the time but never really seemed to say much of anything and Sasuke only spoke in insults and challenges. And those two always seemed like they could barely tolerate each other. And then there was that whole thing about Sasuke apparently planning a murder which Sakura still _really_ didn't know the details of and _really_ wasn't going to tell her parents anything about.

But still, they were her teammates and the three of them had been through a surprisingly large amount of shit together. Who would have thought, right? What with them being ninja and all. Anyway, they were her boys and it was her job to pull them out of the deep end when they inevitably plunged head first into trouble.

The pink haired kunoichi waved as she headed in their direction and sat down on the bench next to the two of them. The second she was on the bench, Naruto launched back into an anecdote about a cat, an old man and a bottle of whiskey, which apparently was true (although perhaps not anatomically possible) and had happened outside his apartment last night. As he was relating the story, he used his hands to describe certain parts and as the elaborate story went on, the hand gestures became more pronounced. His orange and black tracksuit was as glaringly bright as always and the jacket was unzipped halfway, doubtless on account of the almost record breaking heat today.

Sasuke's long dark hair framed his face and he was wearing black ninja trousers with white tape around the bottoms of them and a skin-tight black shirt. He was sitting on the end of the bench, with Naruto between them, leaning forward with his brows drawn together and his fists clenching and unclenching, with what Sakura assumed to be impatience. Whether the agitation was over Kakashi's perpetual lateness or Naruto's failings as a storyteller, Sakura didn't know. What she did know, however, was that she needed to try and diffuse it, for everyone's peace of mind for the day.

Seizing a break in Naruto's speech, she tried to engage both of them in light hearted conversation;

"So, what are you guys planning on doing tonight? We could go out for something to eat when we get off, if you want?"

Two pairs of eyes looked at Sakura; one pair enthusiastic, one pair…less so.

"I call ramen!" Naruto shouted, drawing the attention of everyone in a five metre radius, much to Sakura's embarrassment.

"Shut up, Naruto! You're making everyone stare at us! But yes, I will consider ramen, ok?" She hissed. Turning to Sasuke, she raised her eyebrows.

"Hn, fine." He muttered to her enquiry; affirmative despite looking massively put upon.

Naruto whooped, Sakura smiled and Sasuke rolled his eyes. All was right with the world and the tension was lowered. The kunoichi leaned her back against the wall behind her and settled in for the wait ahead, making light conversation and sorting out plans with her teammates about the day in front of them.

* * *

By the time Kakashi eventually did show up, Sakura wouldn't have minded grinding his face into arsenic – which she had actually been taught about and which she was fully prepared to implement for such a worthy cause. He was later than usual, what could she say? She had had forty minutes to imagine ways to brutally murder him.

He strolled in like he was gracing the three of them with his presence and the pink haired kunoichi could barely contain her growl of outrage. She didn't know why she was surprised though, Kakashi was just like that. Sasuke looked like he had the same poisonous idea as Sakura, and Naruto was already on his feet pointing and shouting.

"You're late! You're later than ever! Why are you so freaking late!?"

Kakashi scratched the back of his head and said; "Well, on my way here there was this old man with a bottle o-"

"I told you!" Naruto screeched, face triumphant and hands flailing in the air. "Didn't I tell you!? Why are you guys looking at me like that?"

Sakura liked to describe her and Sasuke's expression as deadpan.

Rolling her eyes at the sheer level of silliness going on around her, Sakura firmly pushed the blond out of the way so that she could reach Kakashi. With one hand in a fist on her hip and the other stretched out in front of her, the pink haired girl impatiently waited for Kakashi to give her the mission description that was currently tucked casually under his arm.

After he had finally forked it over, the three of them gathered round, pulled it open and hastily read through it. And then three pairs of shoulders promptly drooped, with varying degrees severity.

**_C-Rank:_** _Monitor an animal rights rally in the east side of the city, ensuring that there is no violence and that it doesn't get out of control._

How incredibly dull. There was little chance of action on a mission like that and virtually no chance of proving herself. And it would probably be very boring as the objective was basically to wait around until something happened and then do damage control.

And worse; it was outside in this weather.

Naruto and Sakura both groaned and looked at Kakashi pleadingly. Sasuke didn't but then apparently he was just so stoic that he was immune to the devastating effects of desert intensity heat. The lucky bastard. Sakura couldn't help but wonder if he had brought any sun cream with him today.

"Oh come on, Kakashi-sensei!" Naruto whined, his big blue eyes imploring his teacher while Sasuke sent Kakashi an irritated glare. "We're way too awesome for something as lame as this! I could do this mission in my sleep. Hell, _Konohamaru_ could do this in his sleep, and he's still at school." Sakura nodded along to his words with her hands tapping on her hips in frustration. Forgetting the skills and experience she could have gained, Sakura tetchily thought about how she definitely could have used the money from a B-Rank mission today.

The three of them applied their best cajoling, begging and scowling respectively to try to convince their instructor to go back to HQ and get them a better mission for the day. However despite their pleas, Kakashi apparently didn't know the meaning of mercy.

* * *

Unlike how Sakura used to imagine when she was younger, for the most part shinobi had to take public transport to get around the city for day-to-day business. When she actually started training she learned that there were a few reasons for this. Firstly, Konoha was the capital city of the Fire Country. It was massive, miles in size. By no means did Sakura know where everything was and running around the rooftops with a map was both difficult and inconvenient. Secondly, about 40% of the city was made up of skyscrapers, with thousands of buildings of varying height in the remaining 60%. The skyscrapers were wide apart as they were separated by roads below and were also surrounded by buildings too low down to jump onto from the top of a tower block. Sure, chakra could be used to run down the tower block, but even then the shinobi would just have to run up another skyscraper, which would be a waste of the shinobi's valuable chakra and would take up a lot of time that would be better spent actually doing their mission. Not to mention that hoards of shinobi running up and down the city's buildings would probably scare the crap out of the people living and working inside.

This is how Sakura mollified her crushed fantasies as she rode the train for the second time that day. It's true that they could have hitched a ride on a military van heading out of base but then they would have had to scout for one going near their present destination, and that is harder than it sounds. Plus, Sakura didn't really like cars. Really though, the main deciding factor in favour of their current transport was that, because they were technically still learning, three of them could still use their student travel cards. People naysay about them, but it is a hell of a discount. And she needed the money considering that C and D-Rank missions were basically the shinobi equivalent of minimum wage.

Sakura looked around the carriage. Sasuke and Naruto were bickering; normal. Kakashi was reading porn and not even trying to be subtle; depressingly normal. There was an old woman knitting what looked like a balaclava, a mother with three children; none of which looked remotely like her, and what appeared to be a twelve year old playing on a PSP. Alone. Oh and there was some guy by the doors dressed like a dragon. Spiro? Was he planning on going to the animal rally too? Seriously not normal.

Boy, there were a lot of weirdos on the train at midday.

By this point, Sakura genuinely had no idea where to look and seriously regretted leaving her mp3 in her locker. She could try to join in with whatever Sasuke and Naruto were discussing, but decided to give that a miss. Even if she didn't like it, Sakura had known for a while now that she always tended to be a bit of a third wheel around those two. Of course, they never tried to give that impression (she hoped) but in most of their conversations that she herself didn't start, she always felt like she was just tagging along and somehow intruding upon their long-time rivalry. The two of them had already known each other well by the time she first met them and so she always seemed like the 'newcomer' in their group dynamic. Sakura didn't exactly relish this but she couldn't think of anything to do about it that wouldn't make her come across as 'that person that has to be the centre of attention in every group'. It was fine, really. She already knew that they genuinely cared about her; they'd proven it on plenty of dangerous missions. Sakura liked to think that it wasn't because they thought that she was weak and needed saving. She couldn't always convince herself. But the fact that they cared was enough, right? Besides, she had plenty of friends.

…Yeah. Definitely convincing.

The pink haired kunoichi sighed irritably and fiddled crossly with the bottom of her dress, angry that she was trying to lie to herself and that she was actually whinging about someone else's close friendship. Hell, it was basically a bromance. Even Ino thought so, from what Sakura had told her about the two of them.

She wasn't even going to broach Kakashi for conversation. Getting between her teacher and his porn was just asking for public humiliation.

When the train finally pulled into their station, Sakura was surprised that she hadn't started clawing the walls yet. It had been close. And again, none of this was helped by the fact that being in a train at midday with weather this unbelievably arid was like sitting in a sauna for three hours. In full clothing. Listening to two numbskulls argue about whether kunai or shuriken were better for killing a bear.

In case anyone was interested, the answer was definitely senbon. Then you could go for pressure points and paralyse the bear before getting your arse out of there or beating the crap out of the animal. There, simple.

Now would they _shut up_ about it!

Green eyes flashing with agitation and hip length pink hair whipping behind her, Sakura stomped off of the train and onto the platform, closely followed by Kakashi. And then the other two got off, who were _still_ arguing and showing no signs of stopping. _That is it!_ The headache she had right now could probably knock down a whale.

Sakura turned slowly around to face her blond and blank haired teammates and, when she was certain that she had their attention, heatedly pronounced;

"If you two don't shut the hell up right now, I will feed your **_balls_** to the goddamn bear! Do you hear me?"

And marched off, leaving two frozen teenager boys in her wake and the sound of Kakashi's laughter filling the station.

* * *

Things had calmed down by the time the four of them reached the rally and Sakura had savoured the quiet, brief though it was, during the walk there. Even if by the time she had arrived there, she was a sweaty mess from the heat, with her hair sticking up every which way.

The rest of the mission passed pretty much as expected, with only one minor incident that to be resolved before the rally ended. Some arsehole had thought that it would be funny to antagonise the activists. After some of the stuff that he said, Sakura didn't feel the slightest bit bad about being 'slow' to intervene in the inevitable beaten that had followed.

Other than that it was just mind-numbing. And those two idiot teammates of hers had started arguing again after Sasuke had insulted the blond's ninja capabilities out of sheer boredom and Naruto had risen to the 'challenge'. She had actually had to break up an _internal_ fight. What did that say about her team? And no, dragon guy wasn't even there.

Being a ninja was so boring.

They took the train back to BOT to fill out the mission report, which took about ten seconds to complete considering how little they had to write. After Kakashi had made his exit with a wave and a smile, the three of them went to Yakiniku Q, that nice BQQ place down the road for dinner. Naruto's pointed protests were uniformly ignored.

They sat around the table grilling their ribs and chatting about the boring mission they had had to suffer through today and what each of them had planned for the week ahead.

"Oi, bastard, what are you doing this weekend?" Naruto asked through an overflowing mouthful of bread, forcing Sakura to avert her eyes from the horror.

Grimacing in disgust Sasuke simply reply, "Training."

Sakura noticed that Naruto's eyes lit up with excitement before he said "Awesome, I'd love a good sparring match. What time?"

"Saturday. 8am."

The pink haired girl decided to comment here, hoping to join them, and murmured; "Oh wow that sounds really fun. What time did you sa-"

"So what are you doing this weekend, Sakura-chan?" Naruto obliviously interrupted, on his fourth piece of bread by now and trying to take the pork off of the grill far before it was ready. She was effectively halted from further enquiry as going any further down that path was obviously pointless and would probably come across as terribly sad, even if the only one to notice was Sasuke. Sakura tried to avoid being pathetic. She'd heard that it wasn't becoming.

Sighing huffily, she replied "Um, I don't know, I'll probably go out with Kiba and Ino or something. Maybe study a bit. The Chuunin Exams are coming up, you know. It never hurts to be prepared."

Naruto looked dumbfounded, "Chuunin Exams?! But they're ages away!"

Sasuke snorted derisively while he used a knife to butter his bread and Sakura exasperatedly rolled her eyes. Classic Naruto.

"Naruto, they're only a month away actually. You'll be surprised; a month can go really fast." The kunoichi explained. "Make sure you have time to prepare."

"I'm always prepared!"

Sakura groaned, worried. Naruto leaned forward and reached for her hand across the table.

"Everything will be fine." The blond declared, staring Sakura straight in eye, his own blue eyes shining with faith and hope. "Trust me, Sakura-chan."

When he asked like that, how could she possibly not?

Sakura had gradually discovered since meeting Naruto that he was always the oddest combination of ridiculous tomfoolery and determined heroism and strength. One moment he could be squirting milk out of his nose and cackling like a four year old and in the next he could tell you he was going to punch out the Devil; and make you believe he could. He made people from everywhere, whatever their creed or origin, believe in him and want to follow him, and sometimes just being around him made Sakura feel like she was in the presence of someone special. He caused her to want to strive to be a better person. And then he would do something idiotic like shove three bread rolls in his month at the same time because he thought it would be funny, triggering her to wonder if he really was as daft as she used to believe.

"It better; the whole thing's group reliant, you know." Sasuke muttered, utterly stomping on that precious moment. Naruto choked down the rolls then snapped his head back towards Sasuke and yelled;

"Hey, douchebag, if anyone on this team is deadweight; it's you!"

Sasuke smirked "Hn, really. You see, I seem to remember that one mission in the Tanzaku quarters where you fell off the post office roof while trying to get that old lady's purse back. Ring a bell?"

The blond was outraged. "That doesn't count, you arsehole! It was raining! And dark! And…"

Sakura smiled, sipped her cider and listened to her boys banter. She teased and shared stories and laughed until they all got kicked out of the restaurant at closing time.

Team 7 were still laughing when they stumbled out of the door, with Sakura the most sober as she had been on cider rather than beer, unlike the others. Naruto put his hand on Sasuke's shoulder to steady himself and they all began to stagger back to BOT, as the station was in that direction. A peaceful quiet accompanied their passage back as they passed between the brown and cream tower blocks stretching into the dark sky on either side of them. Sasuke was silent, but then that wasn't at all unusual for him. Although Sakura had had some interesting and some even touching conversations with her black haired teammate, she found he was always far more active and, dare she say it, talkative around Naruto. His blond idiot of a best friend always seemed to bring, perhaps not necessarily the best, but definitely the _most_ out of him. Be it anger, joy, frustration, anything.

Sakura looked over to the dark haired teenager supporting his friend and felt her chest fill with warmth for her team. And a bit of exasperation at the blond for getting so plastered on a work night.

A line forming between her brows, Sakura observed; "He's going to be leaning over the toilet all day tomorrow, I bet."

Sasuke chuffed in amusement and agreement, hefting Naruto more securely against his side when the blond stumbled on a cobble.

There was a pause as Sakura waved to a familiar couple – old friends of her parents – that passed them on the other pavement, heading in the other direction.

"So, Sasuke-kun, your birthday is coming up soon. 23rd of July, right? Do you know what you want me to get you?

At the mention of his upcoming birthday, Sasuke abruptly looked angry and his hands fisted at his sides.

"Sasuke-kun?" Sakura enquired worriedly. She didn't know what had made him so angry all of a sudden.

He didn't answer. What followed was an incredibly awkward ten minute walk to the train station during which Sasuke brooded in ominous silence and Naruto started crooning some nonsense about someone called Gama-chan.

The tension was so thick while waiting on the platform for their separate trains that Sakura was about ready to jump on the tracks just to escape it. From what she could tell, Sasuke wasn't even angry at her anymore. He was just angry. She was running everything that had been said through her head backwards to try and figure out what it was about the mention of his birthday that had upset him so much.

Naruto sobered up a bit after a few minutes and stopped babbling, thank God. The only sounds that she could hear were the wind and Sasuke's knuckles creaking from the strain of being clenched so hard for so long.

The train could not get here fast enough.

It wasn't until Sasuke's train pulled in and he got on with Naruto, leaving her on the station bench alone, that Sakura thought about birthdays themselves. You got older. Sasuke probably wouldn't care about that. You received presents and some people really didn't like writing thank you cards. It sounds extreme considering his level of angry but Sakura knew from experience that tackling that cards list could be soul-destroying. Oh, who was she kidding? Like _Sasuke_ sent thank you cards. You spent lots of time with your family on your birthday.

Oh.

Sasuke's family was dead.

No.

Sasuke's family was murdered.

Sakura put her head in her hands and just thought; _I'm such an idiot._

* * *

By the time the sagging, exhausted pink haired girl had trudged home, it was half eleven getting on twelve and her makeup was smudged was beyond repair from wiping away stray tears. She was so fatigued that for a moment there she genuinely thought that she might have fallen asleep with her head against the door. Jeez, what a day. At this point, Sakura was virtually counting down the minutes until she could be in bed and put the whole day behind her.

She fumbled around in her satchel to get her keys out and then unlocked the front door, trying to be as quiet as possible in case her parents were already asleep. She needn't have worried. From her vantage point in the hall, she could see that her mum and dad were sitting together on the sofa watching late-night game shows and sharing a punnet of raspberries together. God, she loved her parents.

When they heard the front door close, they both looked up with welcoming smiles, which quickly turned worried the moment they saw her no doubt tear blotchy face – for Sakura, every cry was the Ugly Cry. Her mum hurried towards her and asked what was wrong, offering her tissues and comfort while her dad put some tea on for them all. Her bed could wait.

And so she curled between her parents and told them all about her day and what had happened tonight while she sipped her tea – milk, two sugars – and watched reruns of Mastermind. They told her what they thought about it and what they thought she should do about it tomorrow if there was still a problem. They gave their opinion on how they thought she might be able to help Sasuke and they postulated as to why he was still so angry. Everyone agreed that Naruto had been an idiot. Sakura didn't agree with everything that they suggested but they definitely calmed her down and gave her a chance to properly think about what she could actually _do_. Her mum finger combed her long hair and her dad had an arm around her shoulders, hugging her close. Surrounded by her family's care and concern, their love was an almost physical thing. She felt safe, protected and perfectly content.

And she couldn't stop thinking about how both Sasuke and Naruto were going back to empty homes.

* * *

The next morning, a Thursday, saw her at Kikitsu Station as usual. Jet, Bowl-Cut and Red were all in their usual places, prepped and ready to go to work. It was just as hot today as it had been yesterday and once again, Sakura was fully equipped with sunglasses and sun cream. She sat on her bench, which had been unofficially hers for months now. It was in the centre of the platform, it wasn't covered in gum and from it she had a good view of all of the platforms in the station. All it lacked was her name on it. She put her satchel on the floor and lay on her back on the bench, with her legs bent at the knee, looking at the vast, clear blue sky above her.

She really hoped they got a good mission today.

* * *

Just as she had predicted and quite before she knew it, weeks had flown by. Sasuke never mentioned the Birthday Incident and Sakura followed his lead. On the weekends she spent time with her family, Kiba and Ino, and sometimes Sasuke and Naruto. Oh, and she trained. She trained a lot. Still, the green eyed kunoichi wished that she had trained more considering what followed.

Team 7 entered the Chuunin Exams.

Even though it was only their first year of official training, Kakashi had chosen to enter them by the virtue of their exceptional combined group skills. Sakura hadn't been sure if they were ready yet for the notoriously difficult Exams but she supposed there wasn't much to be done about it now. None of them had passed, anyway.

Sakura was finally introduced to Bowl-Cut, who apparently recognised her and had been pining over her for months. Sakura could honestly say that she was simply not interested. She had tried to convey that as politely as possible. His name was Rock Lee and he and his team had also been in the Exam with them.

Team 7 had met a snakelike ninja in the Forest of Death and Sakura kept replaying how he had bitten Sasuke on the neck and left a mark. At the time, the kunoichi had had no idea what it was and no idea how to deal with it. She hadn't even known if Sasuke was going to live. But neither could she completely comprehend that he might've died. Not from a bite. Surely not from a bite. Thank God not from just that bite.

At some point during the second round, Sakura cut off her long hair. She realised that she didn't need it anymore. But more than that she realised that what she really _did_ need was the strength to protect her comrades. The thought of being a liability was intolerable for her. She had put up a fight in her match but it was painful, physically and emotionally, how fast she was knocked out of the preliminaries. Her opponent had simply been too strong. Although most of her just thought that she had simply been too weak. She wasn't good enough. But by God, she would be.

When it became obvious during the preliminary matches that Sasuke's bite was still causing him pain, Sakura was desperate to tell Kakashi. She wasn't a great medic-nin yet but she was certain that something like that couldn't be left untreated. Besides, it had obviously been inflicted by the snake-nin with malicious intent and was therefore clearly unlikely to be beneficial or healthy for him.

Sasuke and Naruto passed fantastically, just as she had known they would and despite the debilitating pain caused by Sasuke's newfound weakness, and would both be in the finals. Even though Sakura was genuinely happy for them and so proud, she couldn't help but feel a bit dejected. What more evidence did she need to tell her that they were on a whole different world from her? She just couldn't ever seem to catch up.

When the armed forces of a terrorist group of ninja soldiers led by a defector from the Konoha military infiltrated and invaded the city, there was chaos. The reasons for and full details of the invasion were not disclosed to the general public or any shinobi below the rank of jonin, due to what was cited as the preservation of national security. That sounded like a load of BS to Sakura but as a lowly genin, who would listen to her complaints?

The first phase of the open attack had occurred in the stadium and the fierce battling that followed had eventually spilled out into the surrounding streets; damaging several flats and a number of restaurants. An entire tower block had been flattened when Sunagakure's redheaded jinchuuriki had gone berserk, before Naruto intervened and defeated the raging ninja, saving Sakura and Sasuke from being crushed by the shinobi.

As far as the media was concerned, only three parts of the invasion were worth broadcasting. The first was, naturally, that the Military of Konoha had dealt with the insurgents swiftly and effectively, limiting the damage. This had successfully aided the reduction and containment of widespread panic among the public. Secondly, that the rebel leader had evaded capture and was still at large. And finally, the most emotive and the most talked about result of the attack was the death of Konoha's beloved Hokage. This news hit harder than most. The Third had been Hokage for a very long time, on either side of the Fourth's reign, and had been a familiar character for generations of Konoha citizens. There wasn't a person in the city who didn't know who he was and just as many loved him. A part of Sakura just couldn't believe that he was gone. He was such an omnipresent figure in the life of the city that his death more than anything seemed to signify the coming of a great change.

Sakura sure hoped that the city was ready for it.

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Author's Note: Well, I hope the first chapter was liked. I should probably have the next chapter out in a few days or so. Feedback is much loved and appreciated!


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